So I wanted to write about an experience I had yesterday of clearly choosing to ignore my inner voice.
The voice I mean is not the monkey brain or ego, its the voice that some may call 'gut instinct' or the whisper of your inner knowledge.
As I was moving through my day I realised it was going to be a tad more challenging than I originally planned, as a mother of a toddler you live for the naps!!! The moments in the day when you can get stuff done, maybe drink a cup of coffee in peace or just get that load of washing out on the line without worrying your child is going to climb the wood pile when your back is turned or run down the drive towards the tractors that aren't on 'child watch'!!
Yesterday the nap did not come, that sacred space of time didn't appear and it wasn't the first day that the nap has been missed, it was the third day in the row that our routine was inextricably thrown out, and as I realised this was going to be another day of full on mothering I heard a little voice within say, why don't you call your mum and ask her to come over for a bit, in response to that voice my answer was 'don't be so silly, you've got this'.
Lunch time came and went, and as I started to re-plan the afternoon I heard that voice again, 'what about your mum', 'or asking for a little help', on the surface the day looked fine, other mums do this all the time, why did I need help, there was no real reason, no urgent lesson to teach or work that couldn't be done with Olive around. So I carried on, ignoring the voice.
The ignoring was the what yoga teachers and spiritual guides to refer to as the 'ego' the moments when we separate from our needs and tell ourselves a different story, to 'man up' to get on with it.....
Well fast forward an hour and you would find me in my car sitting at the side of the road with child asleep in the back and me in tears in the front, overwhelmed, over loaded and in need of a hand!!!! If only I had listened to that inner voice sooner.
I'll caveat and say for all those that suddenly feel deep concern for my well being, I am good, I have had a nights sleep, a decompress with best friends and well it was just 'one of those days'
But the lesson for me and others is, don't ignore the voice, even if the ego wants to tell you it makes no sense, there's something that inner voice knows, it can sense the under surface bubbling, the shifts of emotions and if it tells you something, listen.
How?
This is something, believe it or not I've been trying to consciously practice for a while, and as you can tell I'm still not great at it!!
But the first thing to do is to listen to the small stuff, when are you actually hungry rather than because of a time or waiting until you've nearly collapsed to eat, when do you need to go to the toilet, weird you may think! But we've been conditioned since we we're young to ignore the feeling of needing the loo, when we we're at school we couldn't go we had to learnt to wait, and it continues, until now only really going to the loo when we are desperate, catching ourselves when the ego kicks in and says 'drink/eat/pee in a bit, get this done first!'
As we start to listen to the simple stuff we can start to here the more nuanced stuff, the things that make even greater differences to our days, and slowly after hearing them we can start to learn to respond to them.
So my project now is to not just listen but to respond.
